Petty
Dictionary of Terms and Phrases Used in American or English Jurisprudence · Benjamin Vaughan Abbott · 1879
Dictionary of Terms and Phrases Used in American or English Jurisprudence
See Petit. Photographer. Any person who makes for sale photographs, ambrotypes, daguerrotypes, or pictures, by the action of light.
Act of congress of July 13, 1866, § 9, 14 i Stat. at L. 120 PIEPOUDRE; PIED POUDRE.
Literally, dusty foot. The term is said to have been applied, in old English times, to itinerant traders. Piepoudre court — that is, the pedestrian's or pedler's court — was a kind of court held in old English markets, for the convenience of the itinerant traders. The title is often Anglicized in form into pie-powder; but piepoudre is the preferable spelling. The court was so called, either from the dusty feet of the suitors, or because justice is there done as speedily as dust can fall from the foot; or from pied puldreaux, the old French name for a pedler, or petty chapman. It was a court of record, formerly incident to who owned or had the toll of the market was the judge: the jurisdiction extended to all matters of contract or commercial injuries arising in that very fair or market, and not in any preceding one. The injury must be done, complained of, heard and determined, within the compass of one and the same day, unless the fair continued longer. A writ of error would lie to the courts at Westminster. See Cowel; Wharton.